Product Review: Tom Ford Lipstick Is Half Lipstick, Half Art

Last week, I attended a press event for Tom Ford’s new line of lipsticks. I’m a big lipstick fan, but I’m also fiercely unloyal – I’ll wear anything from drugstore brands to stuff from Sephora, all in search of the perfect color. It’s a trait I get from my mom. Neither of us wears much makeup during the day, but we both rely on lipstick as a way to look pulled-together. Tom Ford told Vogue that one of his memories of his mom was how she’d put lipstick on before answering the doorbell, and I feel the same way about lipstick’s ability to make people look dressed-up instantly.

However, the Tom Ford lipsticks are something completely new for me. For one, they have heft – these aren’t lipsticks you can throw around and abuse, they’re serious, well-crafted products. The heft, combined with the “TF” logo on the top of the lipstick, really drives home the fact that these products, while pricey, are made with care. The line has four nudes (although, as I said earlier, I think we need to find a new term to replace “nude”, four bold shades (including True Coral, at left), and four dramatic shades (including Bruised Plum, at the bottom of the page). Even though I normally prefer berry shades, I have to admit I’ve been utterly won over by the neutrals. Right now, I’m sporting Warm Sable, a beige that might have been the very hue Julianne Moore wore in A Single Man.

There was one thing that bugged me about the lipsticks, though – they smelled faintly of something lovely, but I couldn’t figure it out. Finally, after a couple of days, I believe I have found the formula. Behold: